Biography
Currently (since 2017) Professor Emeritus of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences at the University of Colorado and (since 2015) International Distinguished Professor of Philosophy of Technology at Renmin University of Technology. Undergraduate studies took place at Western Reserve (now Case Western) University, Stanford University, and University of Colorado (BA); graduate studies at University of Colorado (MA) and Fordham University (PhD). Faculty positions prior to the Colorado School of Mines: Berea College (Kentucky), St. Catharine College (Kentucky), Brooklyn Polytechnic University (since merged with New York University), and Pennsylvania State University. Visiting positions at the Universidad de Puerto Rico, Mayagüez (1988), Universidad de Oviedo (1993), the Universities of Tilburg and Twente, Netherlands (1998), and as Fulbright Professor at the Universidad de País Vasco, Spain (2003-2004).
Disciplinary education emphasized the history of Western philosophy, but even as an undergraduate I was struck by the dominating influence of engineering and technology on the world in which I came of age (my father was a registered mechanical engineer). My first two books (1972 and 1973), written with a friend from Stanford, sought to call greater attention to technology and to bridge analytic and phenomenological philosophical discourse. In the 1980s, under the personal influence of Ivan Illich and Rustum Roy at Pennsylvania State University, I began trying to bring philosophy of technology into the interdisciplinary field of Science, Technology, and Society (STS) studies. This period further witnessed early involvements in discussions of engineering ethics. During the 1990s I became attracted to Spanish language philosophy of technology and since the 2000s, influenced by Danial Sarewitz, to the relevance of science policy for understanding contemporary engineering and technology. Since the mid-1990s encounters with the richness of Chinese cultural traditions have stimulated efforts at deeper thinking about the nature and meaning of our increasingly fragile techno-lifeworld. My research has received support from the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education, and other grant making organizations. I was a founding member of the Society for Philosophy and Technology (1976) and greatly benefited from service on the American Association for the Advancement of Science Committee on Scientific Freedom and Responsibility (1994-2000) and expert study groups for the European Commission (2009 and 2012). Current service on the Advisory Committee of the Online Ethics Center has been equally informative. The most important publications in my curriculum vitae would probably include Philosophy and Technology: Technology as a Philosophical Problem (with Robert Mackey, 1972), Theology and Technology: Essays in Christian Analysis and Exegesis (with Jim Grote, 1984), Ethical Issues Associated with Scientific and Technological Research for the Military (with Philip Siekevitz, 1989), Thinking through Technology: The Path between Engineering and Philosophy (1994), The Challenges of Ivan Illich: A Collective Reflection (with Lee Hoinacki, 2002), Encyclopedia of Science, Technology, and Ethics (4 vols., 2005; second edition with J. Britt Holbrook, Ethics, Science, Technology, Engineering: A Global Resource, 2015), Oxford Handbook of Interdisciplinarity (with Robert Frodeman and Julie Thompson Klein, 2010), Ethics and Science: An Introduction (with Adam Briggle, 2012), and Steps toward a Philosophy of Engineering: Historico-Philosophical and Critical Essays (2020). Publications have also appeared in German, French, Spanish, Russian, Chinese, Farsi, and other languages. |
Untitled- Emilie Mitcham
Thicket- Emilie Mitcham
I Thought, "Maybe"- Emilie Mitcham
By Way Of Explanation- Emilie Mitcham
Immediately, We're Lost- Emilie Mitcham
Insight- Emilie Mitcham
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